


On the Mend

by hannelore



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Snape Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-11
Updated: 2015-02-11
Packaged: 2018-03-11 15:19:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3330665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannelore/pseuds/hannelore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Board of Governors demands that Headmistress Minerva McGonagall make school easier for students after the war, Severus believes he can help. However, Minerva has not spoken to him since he fled Hogwarts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On the Mend

**Author's Note:**

> For Severus_Fest on LJ. Thanks to akatnamedeaster and sionna_raven for a wonderful fest! Many thanks to my patient and awesome beta, pauraque.

_Defence Against the Dark Arts: Severus Snape._

Severus stared at the letter. When he had seen the Hogwarts seal, he had thought it was a cruel joke. But there was Minerva's signature: _Headmistress Minerva McGonagall._ The faculty letter had none of Albus's usual wit, something that turned his stomach. He looked at his own name again, completely bewildered. He was being called back to Hogwarts. He sat at his desk, staring at the blank parchment. He fully intended to refuse the Hogwarts position, but his gaze kept straying to Minerva's signature. She would have had to approve his return, let alone allow him to teach anything other than Potions. Severus crumpled up the parchment, tossing it in a corner. So many letters he had attempted ended this way; how was he ever going to write this one?

_Coward._

His lip twitched in anger. It was easier to remember the fury, the disdain. He wanted it to poison his grief, to blot out the need for her forgiveness. But no matter how many times he mentally fled from her, he kept wanting to return. To apologise. If he refused her request to teach at Hogwarts, he might never have the chance to seek forgiveness.

He folded her letter carefully and held it in his trembling hands. He desperately wanted to read between the lines of her letter, which had clearly been just one of several copies owled to the rest of the faculty. Severus drew his thumbs against the parchment, a sudden thought seizing him with fear. Perhaps she only wished to punish him. Maybe she wanted to mock him. Teach the children defence _against_ the Dark Arts, magic she knew was his area of expertise. It would have been better had she assigned him to Potions, then he would not have to wonder ---

He reached for an envelope and addressed it to the Daily Prophet, care of Rita Skeeter.

***

The voices inside Minerva's office had become so loud that even students in the corridor turned their heads round to look. Severus glared at them to hurry on their way. But when no one was left in sight, he inched closer to the door.

"-- absolutely not. With a longstanding tradition of superior education -- "

"-- one would think you simply don't care!"

The door flew open with a _bang_ upon the last word.

"Good day, Madame Macmillan."

"You will have your answer for the Board by next Friday!" A short, plump woman rushed from the office. She waved her finger accusingly. "Threats will _not_ be accepted!"

The door slammed shut in the woman's face and she gaped for a moment, blinking as if slapped. She looked at Severus and straightened herself up indignantly before she stormed down the hall.

Severus rapped on the door.

"You said next Friday!"

"It's Severus."

The door opened slightly.

"I -- and the entire school -- couldn't help but notice something's amiss."

Minerva looked at him as if he were a pile of owl droppings. "Yes?"

"What did she want?"

Minerva looked at him as if she were about to order him to leave, but then she snatched a piece of parchment from her desk and handed it to him.

"Hogwarts Board of Governors," Minerva said. "They are requesting -- no -- _demanding_ I change how education is taught here. They want it to be easier, more forgiving due to... to the circumstances of the last school year."

Severus took the parchment and glanced at it. "I take it you disagree?"

"It's obvious I do," Minerva said curtly. "Their demands are simply unreasonable. She had the audacity to say that I don't care about the students simply because I feel the rigours of a Hogwarts education should remain in place."

"You feel it's what Albus would have done."

He immediately regretted speaking Albus's name. The color drained from her face before she continued.

"It's what _I_ will do. The rest of the staff is not so agreeable, however. Pomona already had it out with me this morning and it was all I could do to get Filius to return..."

Minerva snatched the parchment from him and tossed it in the fire.

"I --"

"I'm not saying anything further about it. However, since you are here perhaps you can explain _this_." Minerva flipped the Daily Prophet over so that the top headline faced him. He felt the heat rise to his cheeks as he read the headline: _"To Hell And Back Again: The Severus Snape Story."_

"'Severus Snape, having barely survived one of the last attacks of You-Know-Who, bravely watched over Hogwarts during its most difficult times.'" Minerva read aloud. "'Tears brim in his sorrowful eyes as he wonders aloud how those same children could go back to the school where such horrors had occurred.'"

"I was speaking rhetorically!" Snape protested. "I never suggested --"

"'I regret how these children suffered under my watch and how I was unable to intervene,' says Snape bravely.'" Minerva looked up from the newspaper and glared at him before she continued. "'They will truly live out those memories to the end of their days.'"

Minerva slapped the newspaper down on the desk. She pressed her palms against the desk, leveling her gaze at him. He had thought he was ready for this particular altercation, but the way his heart thumped wildly in his chest, he realized he was not.

"You had the nerve to mention the _children_ alongside your so-called 'brave deeds,'" Minerva said.

"I had to do that," Severus pointed at the newspaper accusingly. "I had to clear my name publicly! Any -- any type of embellishment was the work of Rita Skeeter. I don't have to tell _you_ that."

She did not reply immediately, but only stared at him as if prying apart his intentions. He safeguarded himself against Legilimency, out of habit, before he remembered there was no way she could read his thoughts.

"How do you suppose I am to placate the parents of Hogwarts children who are pressuring the Board to have us allow the re-taking of examinations and making up assignments as one wishes?"

"We could pressure them right back," Severus said. "Voldemort may be gone, but I am not certain if any of his true followers remain. We can make the parents and the Board see their children still need to be prepared for anything."

"We?" Minerva said sharply.

"As you said," Severus said with a sarcastic tone, "the press loves me. The tragic _hero_. We tell them that young witches and wizards need to be trained just as dutifully as they have in the past and, perhaps, the Board will agree."

Minerva was quiet for a moment, her gaze turning to the wall where Albus's portrait gazed serenely into the distance. Severus felt a stab of hatred as he forced himself to look away. _Still pretending you're not meddling, Albus?_

"The hearing will be in front of the entire Board of Governors," Minerva said finally. "Several on that board --" Her voice broke slightly. "-- their children died in the war."

Despite her seemingly momentary weakness, Severus felt himself wither under her disdain. His mind was racing. He wanted to be honest with her, to ask her all the questions he was holding back. But there was a barrier between them as solid as Hogwarts's rebuilt walls.

"Then our task will be that much more difficult," Severus tried to sound kindly, but it was not something that came naturally to him. His voice sounded strained to his own ears. " Hogwarts should continue as it was."

"For the sake of the living," Minerva added. There was no glimpse of weakness anymore. She drew herself upright. "For the sake of the _truly_ brave."

Severus wanted to look away, but he forced himself to meet her gaze. Forgiveness, it seemed, was very far away.

***

"Several owls from members of the Board," Minerva said, crumbling the smouldering remains of what must have been Howlers in her fist. "They think it's disrespectful that I am even attempting to refute their decision."

"You still will not accept my help?" Severus said.

"Not in the way that you want to give it." Minerva said.

"Why did you let me come back?" Severus blurted out. "Why, if you mistrust me still?"

Minerva glanced to the wall. Severus followed her gaze, fearing she was looking upon Albus's portrait again but it seemed she was simply looking away.

"My reasons are my own." Minerva stared back down at her desk, at the ashes of parchment that still dusted her fingertips. "Though I would think you would know why."

"I can't say I am certain."

He hoped his confession would move her to explain, but she remained silent.

Severus turned to leave, but her voice stilled him.

"Severus."

"Yes?"

"You will go to the Board with me. We will present our case to them and if they stand down, you will help me preserve this school's education as it ought to be."

***

"Headmistress, what is the meaning of bringing _him_ here?"

Severus looked up at the accusing glares of the twelve Board of Governors assembled. He knew,

as Minerva had told him earlier, who each of them were and he was quite sure that not one of them felt favorably toward him.

"Professor Snape is a professor of Hogwarts," Minerva said. "He feels as I do. The education of Hogwarts should remain as rigourous as it always has."

"My son still has nightmares about that man!" a woman with a fur stole interrupted, jabbing her finger accusingly at him.

"This is not a trial of whether or not Professor Snape should be teaching at Hogwarts,"

Chairwoman Macmillan interrupted. "May we remind you that we are not suggesting that the education of our children be watered down or degraded, Headmistress? Simply put, we believe they should be allowed some leniency during these troubled times."

"Troubled times?" Minerva scoffed. "We now live in some of the easiest times the wizarding world has ever had! If Snape is the only thing of children's nightmares, what a blessed world we live in."

There was a faint chuckle from someone on the Board, though from whom Severus could not tell.

"Your children deserve the best possible education from Hogwarts," Minerva continued. "Show them that we expect the most of them and not an ounce less."

"The restrictions we seek are temporary," Chairwoman Macmillan said, glowering down at them. "We outlined that in our letter."

"Right now is when the children of Hogwarts need their knowledge tested." Severus stood up. "Not just their knowledge, but their allegiance. They need to know that they are in the care of the finest leaders who will expect nothing less than their best."

The Board was silent as they watched him and Minerva. He had been prepared for her to give him a scathing look, but she only looked ahead at the board impassively. Severus took a deep breath as he drew back his left sleeve to reveal the faint scarring: all that remained of the Dark Mark. A gasp went around the room.

"Some things can never be forgiven or forgotten," Severus said. "Your children have suffered the worst imaginable. We cannot be complacent in peacetime; we simply cannot afford it when enemies could be anywhere. Or anyone. Let us teach the children fiercely so that we may live freely."

The room was silent as he covered his forearm once more and sat back down. Minerva was still standing, though she rested her fingertips upon the table. He noticed her hands trembling just slightly. She did not look at him.

***

Minerva stopped him as they left the room, the educational decree with its barely-hardened seal gripped tightly in her hand.

"I can't quite put my finger on whether they're now more afraid or impressed," she said.

"Either one works," Severus said. "The curriculum will stay as it is. Isn't that what you wanted?"

"Yes..." Minerva fingered the seal with her thin fingertips. She glanced over at him and gave him a rare smile that reminded him of kinder days.

"This wasn't any of my doing," Severus added. "It's ultimately you they look to. Hogwarts could not have a better Headmistress."

"What you've done here..." Minerva said. "It's a start."

"It was for the good of the school."

"Was it?"

Severus hesitated. He still wanted her forgiveness, but now he knew it would not be given in the way he might have hoped. Though her stern look had softened a little, he knew a friendship with Minerva would need to be re-earned. If it took years, he would stay all those years to make it right. They had many things to talk about and perhaps this event was the key to opening that seemingly impenetrable door. Perhaps things could never be the same, he knew that now. His entire life -- his entire purpose -- was different now. He felt as if a weight had lifted from his shoulders. Old wounds and memories: he would heal.

"We ensured the children will be complaining about how difficult examinations are for years to come," Severus said with a ghost of a smile.

Minerva chuckled. "Yes. Yes, we did do that."


End file.
